Maturity in Purity
by Lavenderpaw
Summary: This is for all the young ladies out there who are thinking about the final stage...


**A/N:** Thought I forgot my Amdrag peeps, didja? ;)

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Teardrops fell in streaks down her round, light brown cheeks, mascara intermingling with them as the girl's wisps of ebony locks twirled around in the evening breeze. Haley sat on the roof edge of her brownstone house, a fully-blossomed red rose twirling in mesmerism between her small hands. She looked up as she clutched Jeffery's coat closely around her.

_He forced me down and I told him to stop..._ Haley thought with a breathy shudder. _What would Sun Park say?_

The dragoness had moved on to teach another student. _What about Mom?_ She was out of town for a catering convention. "And what would I tell my dad? He'd never let me date."

"Haley," Rose's voice came from the tapestry entrance. "I heard about tonight."

"How?" She asked with a startled sob at the intrusion.

"Jake and I spoke with some of your friends at the movies."

"Just go away." The thirteen-year-old griped at her. "I don't need a pep talk."

She sensed the nineteen-year-old approach from behind, and turned up with misty brown eyes at her. "Beautiful flower," the older girl said before she could get out another word of stubbornness. "And I should know." Rose said with some light humor, smiling gently.

"What's in a name?" Haley turned away and muttered grumpily, rubbing at her tears.

"I'm guessing Juliet had some real trouble tonight when it came to getting serious." She sat down cross-legged a few feet from the girl. " Haley, we've known each other for these last few years and I'd like to think in that time we've gotten to know each other. I mean…" Rose glanced down with a heavy sigh at her dragon-marked wrist. "You know."

"We've never really talked." Haley reminded her, but also took notice of the biologically distinctive branding that the older girl was marked with. "I've never held it against you."

"But you've kept your distance." Rose met her eyes and Haley turned away, however, the more experienced of the two kept talking. "If it's any consolation Haley, I do know what it feels like to be taken advantage of; especially by men." Sympathy entered her blue eyes when Haley re-met hers, she said with realization. "I suppose on some level we can relate."

"We're girls," Rose smiled, brushing some of her golden blonde hair back behind her ear. "It's in our nature to relate on many levels." The two laughed a little, and Haley allowed her brother's fiancé' to lay a comforting arm around her shoulders. "Even if I wasn't in fact raised by the Huntsman, the memories can still be very burdening to me sometimes."

The gesture of another person touching her should have made her feel uncomfortable, but Haley could now feel that that was what she had needed. Now the girl looked down once more at the crimson spiraled flower that served a reminder of the maturity that she had rejected.

"You should feel proud." Rose told her.

"Everyone else did it, maybe I should have given in some more…"

"No," The young woman took her chin and moved Haley's eyes to make contact with hers. "You're not ready for a red rose yet. You're still…" she frowned a little as she trailed off before meeting her gaze again. "white. Pure. You have nothing to be ashamed of."

Haley rolled her brown eyes a little. "That's not what the private school girls will say."

Rose lifted her blonde brows suggestively, smirking a bit. "Then transfer." She gave the girl a reassuring pat on the forearm and walked back for the open tapestry door to head back down inside. Haley sighed and pulled the jacket closer to her. There was suddenly a rush of wings from behind her and she turned back around to see nothing but the night air.

But turning back around she found the red rose was gone as well.

"Hello?" Haley looked around and over the edge to see if it was falling, but not even her strong nocturnal vision could make out the slender shape of the falling flower. It was the only thing she had had of tonight. Bringing her legs up, Haley buried her face into her lap.

"Nothin' wrong with waitin', sis." A pair of scaly lips pressed against her temple.

"Jake?"

When she looked up no one was around except for a fully-blossomed white rose residing patiently in her lap, it's snowy petals folded out without fear but without a full knowledge of what the outside world would do to it. Haley picked it up and pleased to see that it had no thorns or stickers around it, brushed her coal-colored hair to slid it behind a morphed dragon ear. _This way I'll hear him better the next time he tries to mess around in my life._

She smiled with a devilish delight.

XD

LP


End file.
